


Need Against Need

by blue_spruce



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-29
Updated: 2016-06-10
Packaged: 2018-05-29 23:22:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6398407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blue_spruce/pseuds/blue_spruce
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The door closes with a pneumatic <i>whoosh</i> and Jess turns to face Poe fully, her hands settling on her hips. “But she’s not one of <i>us</i>, Poe, come on.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The day that Rey and Luke come back, the Resistance throws a party. There’s an official announcement and everything; the General calls the whole base together and gives a speech about how much they’ve lost, how hard everything has been. “We must take these moments of celebration when they come,” she says, holding her chin high, and all around Jessika people are cheering, applauding, lifting up their hands. Over to her right Jess can see Poe bring his fingers to his mouth but she can’t even hear his normally ear-piercing whistle over the cacophony.

Jess smiles, but it feels wrong on her face. When she brings her hands together, again and again and again, the moment stretching on and on, the motion feels mechanical. She’s relieved when the crowd starts breaking up, people drifting towards the barracks in groups of two and three.

Poe catches her in the hallway between the pilot’s debriefing room and the room she shares with Mattis Kit. “Hey, you,” he says, slinging his arm over her shoulders and shaking her a little. “I have it on good authority the General is breaking out the good stuff tonight.” She can hear the laughter in his voice when he leans in even closer. “Also,” he murmurs, “I picked up some...contraband on my last supply run.”

“Oh?” Jess elbows Poe’s ribs. “All-pilot afterparty, huh?” It’s not a question; it’s tradition.

“Mmhmm.” Poe drops his arm from her shoulders when they reach her room. Jess is opening the door when he clears his throat. “You think anyone would mind if Finn came too?”

He’s asking like it’s a foregone conclusion that of course _Jessika_ won’t mind, and Jess is still processing that fact when he adds, “Well, and I guess Rey, too.”

“Rey?” Jess asks, her whole body tensing. She wrenches her door the rest of the way open, just for something to do with her hands.

“She is a pilot,” Poe points out, like he’s suddenly realized that maybe Jessika does mind after all. He follows Jess into her room and drops down onto the edge of her bed. “I mean. Technically.”

“Yeah, maybe _technically_ ,” Jess says. The door closes with a pneumatic _whoosh_ and Jess turns to face Poe fully, her hands settling on her hips. “But she’s not one of _us_ , Poe, come on.”

The way Poe is looking at her has blood rushing to Jess’s face, hot and unpleasant. “Finn saved my life,” Poe says, the words almost without inflection. “And Rey saved his, Rey saved all our asses and is the best hope we _have_ , and they both gave up everything to join the Resistance, so don’t tell me –”

“So did Lang,” Jess says over top of him, throat tight. “So did Bliedow Fleck and Tilts and Rathat and Andela and –” Her voice breaks and she swallows hard. “And Eliska, and all the others who I’ve watched get shot out of the goddamn sky, Poe, and it’s always been us. It’s always –”

She closes her eyes and bites her lip, then brings her hands up to her face, feeling the prickle of encroaching tears. The last time they were all together, all her flyboys, Poe had produced a seemingly endless supply of Corellian spiced ale and they’d stayed up in the hangar working on the X-wings and gossiping and singing vulgar drinking songs until the sky was starting to lighten. Eliska flirted with her more and more outrageously all night, and then they’d broken into the transport ship and fucked on one of the uncomfortable bench seats, desperate and sloppy and laughing with the joy of it.

“Jess,” Poe says, and she can’t bear the softness in his voice, she can’t stand it, but when his arms slide around her a moment later she tucks her face against his neck.

They stand like that for a long time, Poe's hands tracing idle patterns over her back. Jess scrunches her eyes shut, trying not to remember. It’s impossible. The images come quick and vibrant: Lang juggling wrenches in the hangar, Rathat’s beautiful dark skin shining with sweat and grease, Andela’s head thrown back with laughter. Eliska grinning, eyes bright behind her visor, and the way she’d always wiggle her wings in a salute at the start of every mission.

She thinks of Rey, then, and how everyone loves her; Poe and Leia, everyone. Rey didn’t even know what the Resistance _was_ the morning one of the First Order patrols hit Eliska’s X-wing right in the fuel tank. And now everyone is looking at her with hope in their eyes. It has ugly things jangling around in Jess’s chest, a hard knot of resentment pulling tighter every time someone mentions her name.

“They don’t have anyone,” Poe says quietly, after enough time has passed that Jessika’s eyes are safely dry. “Not anyone, Jess.”

She pulls in a breath, slowly, and lets it back out. “I know,” she says, finally, straightening up and untangling herself from Poe’s arms. She turns away, towards her tiny closet, and rummages determinedly through her few clothing options. “I know.” Her heart hurts. “Whatever, tell them to come.”

There’s a brief silence. “Thanks,” Poe says. Jess blinks hard. It’s the right thing to do, she knows it, but she can’t quite bring herself to say _you’re welcome._

“Get outta here, Dameron,” she says instead, flipping back through the hangers. “Go make yourself pretty for your boy, laserbrain.”

She stands there until the door swishes open and then shut again, and then she turns, her back to the wall, and slides down to sit on the floor.

Her throat feels like it’s closing again, and her eyes are burning. Maybe she’ll just sit here for a while, she thinks tiredly, leaning her head back against the wall. Maybe she’ll just rest, just for a bit.


	2. Chapter 2

Nothing about her return to D’Qar is going like Rey imagined. She’d spent the entire trip back with Luke dreaming of it: she’d see Finn as soon as she landed, hole up with him somewhere, tell him everything. And he’d tell her everything that happened here while she was gone.

But here she is at this – this afterparty, Poe called it, and Finn is beaming at her but also beaming at Poe. It’s awful. It’s not at all how she thought this night would go.

She wants Finn to want her  _ most.  _ She wants to take Poe and shove him in the cargo bay of one of the transporters. She wants BB-8 to stop being so damn cheerful, circling constantly around Poe’s feet. 

The party is loud, loud and busy and more than a bit overwhelming after the long silent days she’s spent with Luke. There’s music playing underneath the sounds of dozens of conversations, all punctuated by bursts of bright laughter and celebratory shouting. “Sorry,” she says, pulling her gaze away from where Finn is laughing at something Poe said. “Say that again?”

“Tell us about Luke, I said.” Rey can’t remember the name of the woman she’s speaking with; she’s tall and has short, spiky red hair. She’s holding a cup of the same liquor Poe had pressed into Rey’s hand half an hour ago, something sweet and spicy that burns like fire. 

Another pilot swings into the loose circle of faces turned expectantly towards Rey. “Luke?” he says, throwing an arm over the shoulders of the red-haired woman. “Ah, yes. You’re Rey.” He sounds like he knows her. She doesn’t know him, not even his name. “You have stories about Luke Skywalker. Spill, come on, don’t hold back.”

Rey tilts her head, making a show of thinking it over. “Well,” she says finally. “He’s very quiet. I did see him explode some things, though.”

“With the Force?” someone asks eagerly.

“With the Force,” Rey confirms.

The same conversation plays itself over and over as the night grows old. It feels like she’s being shown off; it feels like a spectacle. Finn finds her in the crowd, loses her, finds her again, and all the while the X-Wing hanger grows more raucous, sound echoing off the metal walls. It’s not the worst thing that’s ever happened to her, not by a long shot, but the feeling of disappointment curling through her chest is weirdly sharp.

It’s much later when Rey slips away. She remembers where the barracks are from before, and Leia had promised her earlier in the evening that there was a room with her name on the door. The thought of finally lying down, of finally being alone, sounds like the best thing in the galaxy.

Rey sighs with relief when she pulls the door to the hanger shut behind her, and then startles an instant later when something moves in the darkness by her feet.

“What––” she says, wishing desperately for a light. The moon breaks through the clouds just then, and the formless shape against the wall resolves into a dark-haired woman sitting next to the door. “Oh. Hello.”

They’d been introduced once before, Rey thinks, racking her brain for the name. Jessika. Jessica something, she can’t remember what. 

Jessika is looking at her silently, arms folded around her knees. “I’m just,” Rey starts, expecting a greeting and feeling increasingly off-kilter when she doesn’t receive one. “I'm just, um, looking for my room? Sorry if I startled you.” 

She hears Jessika sigh. “It’s that way,” she says finally, tipping her chin slightly to the left. “I can show you if you want.” The words come out slowly, begrudgingly, but Jessika is already shifting, clearly ready to stand up.

“No,” Rey says hastily. She wants to be alone with a sudden fierceness that cuts like a physical hunger. “No, I’m fine.” 

She takes a moment to gather herself and then starts to walk in the direction Jessika had pointed. 

It’s a relief when nothing follows her but silence.


	3. Chapter 3

It’s cloudy on Jessika’s day off. It smells like rain right from the moment she steps outside in the morning, but the wind is warm against her face. Jess decides she’s spending the day outdoors before she even makes it to the mess hall for breakfast. 

She eats quickly and then goes to the kitchen to pack a lunch. It’s quick work: the Resistance isn’t low on supplies, but there’s not much variety. Jess finds some ration bars and a carbo-protein biscuit and throws them into her knapsack. There’s a stick of jewel-fruit concentrate lying next to a crate of ration bars, and Jess picks it up on her way out of the kitchen. 

Her mother used to always pack something sweet in the lunchbag she would send Jess off to school with. Jess lets herself sink into memory for a breath, the span of a few heartbeats. Her mother’s face; her long black hair, peppered through with gray; the laugh-lines crinkling at the corners of her dark eyes. 

She shakes herself back to the present when she feels the faint pressure at the back of her eyes that signals the possibility of tears. Later, she tells herself, hitching her bag higher on her back and nodding to one of the new pilot recruits as he waves in her direction. Later, out in the woods where no one can see.

-

The trail Jess follows is hardly deserving of the name, a barely-there track winding through the forest, through overgrown brush and prickling brambles up the ridge overlooking the base. It’s quiet. It’s cooler under the trees than it had been down among the buildings but somehow the air seems even more humid. Jess breathes in time with her footfalls and feels like she’s drowning.

It doesn’t start to rain until Jess is already scrambling up the steep incline near the peak of the ridge, jumping from boulder to boulder. The birds go quiet and then there’s nothing but the sound of raindrops pattering against the broad leaves high over Jess’ head. 

She’s breathing hard by the time she reaches the top, flushed and warm despite the soaking rain. It’s good to sit down on the large flat rock by the golden pine and shrug off her pack. 

Jess lays back against the rock as the rain grows heavier. There are times in a pilot’s life when the awareness of being alive grows vibrantly bright. Not during a firefight, usually, but after: blood thrumming in your ears and skin vibrating with the knowledge that you made it through. 

This, now, is like that: the bright gray light filtering through the rain, the heavy humid air, the stones’ wet warmth under her hands all suddenly strangely solid and hyperreal. This is what is. This world, with friends and lovers dead and danger looming; this world and no other. And her alive, here, to see it.

The tears catch Jess by surprise, but then, she doesn’t cry often, so they always do. She closes her eyes and lies still, digging her fingertips into crevices in the rocks, and lets the rain wash the evidence off her skin.


End file.
